EMAIL SIGN UP!
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Nobel Laureate Shares Her Views on Peace During PeaceJam at Oregon State University
Nobel laureate Jody Williams sat on the stage, wearing a T-shirt, jeans and black cowboy boots with teal stitching. She dangled one leg over the edge, swinging her foot as she spoke to an audience that packed the Memorial Union Ballroom.
Jody Williams shows a bomblet from a U.S. made cluster bomb to students during a private lunch at the memorial Union on the Oregon State University campus Saturday during the Peace Jam.(Andy Cripe/Gazette-Times) "Real, sustainable peace is not just the absence of war. Real, sustainable peace is a world in which people's basic needs are met," Williams said. "War is just powerful people wanting other people's resources. War is not glorious."
It was Williams' second time participating in PeaceJam, an international education program that works with Nobel Peace Prize winners to engage young people in volunteerism and encourages them to transform themselves, their communities and the world. About 300 students, teachers and college mentors attended the two-day PeaceJam conference at Oregon State University.
After the speech, students rushed the stage. Walter Serafini, from Vacaville, Calif., hopped on stage and put his arm around Williams for a photo.
"Would you sign this?" asked Jovan Olison, from People's High School in Vallejo, Calif. Williams signed Olison's orange PeaceJam T-shirt. "Women rock!"
Lincoln School students Annika Gabriel, 13, Grace Spann, 13, and Rose Goldberg, 13, all from Corvallis, huddled around Williams. "Nice to meet you. I really enjoyed your speech," Gabriel said.
"I love that she talked to us like adults. We can understand this," Spann said.
"Better than a rock star," said Gabriel of Williams' presence.
Williams received the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with the campaign she worked for, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
"The overarching objective is to create a new generation of peacemakers for positive change in the world," said Ann Robinson, the affiliate director. "We believe it starts with feeling like personally you can make a change. Your actions matter."
And action is required.
"Emotion without action is irrelevant," Williams said.
In the afternoon, PeaceJam participants went to work at 13 different service projects in the community.
Williams joined 15 students at the Starker Arts Garden for Education. Volunteers tend the 1-acre garden, and the organic produce goes to local food banks and soup kitchens, said manager Travis Whitmer.
"No spraying the Nobel laureate," Williams said, joking as she walked by students watering savoy cabbage starts they'd planted.
Attending for the first time, Hector Cisneros, from Linus Pauling Middle School, planted broccoli. "I like the Nobel laureate," he said. "She's open-minded. She doesn't leave her feelings inside her. She doesn't care what people say."
Three students from Whidbey Island, Wash., gathered around Williams.
"We were talking about peas," said Nicole Ledgerwood, 16, of Clinton, Wash. All three wore necklances with peace symbols. "We bought these as a kind of bonding thing in Corvallis."
Taya Jae, 16, from Langley, Wash., threw her arms around Williams and gave her a long embrace. "I felt compelled to hug her."
"I love PeaceJam," Williams said. "I really believe it transforms the lives of kids. And they're fun. I like the kids."
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
7 Comments so far
Show AllThis article needs to end with a flourish that pays homage to other powerful [female] peacemakers such as Dorothy Day, Helen Caldicott, and Joan Chittister.
Ending in the peapatch with peace-symbol necklaces and hugs just does not convey the seriousness of that little bomblet in Ms. Williams' hand.
Trivializing war is exactly what's wrong with American consciousness. That piece of techno-killing is one of the most heartless things America has thinging out there in the land beyond the reach of today's television reporters.
Its gruesome bloodiness should be especially emphasized by Cheryl Hatch, otherwise, she's just another reporter embedded in Rupert Murdoch's pocket.
I think the PeaceJam is a great idea. Kudos to Laureate Williams for starting and maintaining it!
In a nation which discourages original thinking, inquiring inspirational minds, and rewards by rote memorization and political correctness, the only thing that might possibly save us is to stimulate the minds of the young (our future) and keep the spark alive. That is the only thing that may work.
The alternative is to continue on the way we are going until we are a nation of hungry, homeless robots, begging and squabbling amongst ourselves for the small crumbs left us by the Oligarchy. As in Orwell's "1984," every shortage will become an increase, eternal vigilance is the only thing that can save us, hence the "thought police" (Homeland Security). History even now is being rewritten and taught to the young. Big Brother is always right, and Oceania has ALWAYS been at war with Eurasia! (Or is it Eastasia?)
Anything that will inspire our youth to be aware of what is happening and instill a desire to fix it is really important.
Last week sent the following e-mail to my large family and in-laws:
Family,
A recently released video by the organization WikiLeaks.org made international headlines by showing a July 2007 shooting incident outside of Baghdad in which U.S. forces wounded two children and killed over a dozen people, including the father of those children and two Reuters employees. Two soldiers, Josh Stieber and Ethan McCord, have written an open letter of apology to the Iraqis who were injured or lost loved ones during the attack. They both served in the company depicted in the video, Bravo Company 2-16. They report that such atrocities were regular occurrences over the 9 years of invasion and occupation.
Please help spread Josh and Ethan's message of reconciliation and responsibility.
You can view the Wikileaks video here:
http://www.collateralmurder.com/
Please consider adding you name to their letter here:
http://www.lettertoiraq.com
Thanks,
Paul
In conjunction with the IVAW - Iraq Veterans against the War
Not a single family member, except a brother in Toronto, who left the US, in a large part, because the war.
The only visible response was a mindless right wing chain-e-mail from a tea party brother in Virginia. I'm sure there was a lot electronic chatter behind my back about it. Apologizing to widows, mothers, and orphan victims of our military! How scandalous! How extremist and "left wing"!
If there is one thing that has visibly aged me more than anything else over the past decade or so is trying to get my mind around the fact that my fellow citizens really don't care in the least about the slaughter done in their name - not in the least!
Maybe those on CD who read this will do better - PLEASE add your name to the letter!
OK
"War is just powerful people wanting other people's resources."
An amazingly succinct, brief and true statement.
Reading the reactions and positive tone of those young citizens does a heart good.
I can't believe so few people responded here. I wanted to read it before this, but... so much to do, so little time.
I think what she is doing is exactly what is needed, making young people aware of the other side and HOW to do it. How to create a world that could be peacful and sustain it. Most young people are being brain washed into thinking that the world is all about competition.